by Ira S Kapany, Grade 6, and Riddhi Mantri, Grade 7
In the Masterclass ‘Wordless Warmth,’ author-illustrator Ogin Nayam introduced the audience to his wordless picture book When the Sun Sets, shortlisted for the 2025 Neev Book Award. He noted how everything was left to the reader’s interpretation in wordless picture books, how the ideas and concepts in the book were fluid, and that each page had its own stories.
Ogin also spoke about his inspirations for the book, and why he drew each character the way he did. He represented the rainbow figure as a circle because rainbows are actually circles (humans only see half of them). He drew the sun as feminine because although in most cultures, the sun is considered male, in several cultures of Arunachal Pradesh (where Ogin is from), the sun is seen as female. He talked fondly about how he finds inspiration from his everyday surroundings and experiences, such as borrowing ideas from his sister’s attire to draw the sun’s clothing.
As Ogin told the story unfolding in his book the way he saw it, readers in the audience were taken aback by how each of them had vastly differing interpretations of the same book. Ogin pointed out how that was the best part of a wordless book: you can interpret it in a thousand different ways each time you read it. Wordless picture books are not only accessible for most age groups, but also require you to implement your own imagination and try to decipher the story.
With this new perspective in mind, the audience was bursting with questions, asking Ogin about his favourite medium (watercolour), to how long he took to make the book, and how many drafts he went through before the story took its final form.
To sum up, When the Sun Sets is a book that can be interpreted in many different ways, sometimes even by the author themselves. Each such interpretation is beautiful in its own way, and each illustration carries a meaning of its own. After all, “a picture speaks a thousand words”, doesn’t it?
